The present invention relates to an image processing method and apparatus for generating an image suitable for identification based on a blood vessel pattern of a biological entity.
The blood vessel pattern of a human finger and the like is unique to the individual. Therefore, there are identification systems for identifying users based on blood vessel patterns. Such identification systems extract blood vessel pattern data from image data obtained by capturing an image of the finger of the user and compare the extracted blood vessel pattern data and previously held blood vessel pattern data for identification.
The above-mentioned identification systems, however, have a problem in that captured image includes images of patterns other than the blood vessel pattern or false images, so the precision of extraction of the blood vessel pattern data is low and practical application is difficult.